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CURE Costa Rica 2017

Attendees

Shown are the participants of the 7th International Conference on Human Rights and Prison Reform in San Jose, Costa Rica in April 25-29. The theme was the Mandela Rules, which were adopted unanimously in 2015 by the United Nations and named after former prisoner and South African President Nelson Mandela.

Networking

Networking was very much part of the conference. Shown left to right are bottom row: Lymarie Nieves, Puerto Rico; Martina Cicero, Argentina; and Alejandra Rosero, California and top row: Alan Vicens, Puerto Rico; Nilda Martin, New York; and Tess Kimura, Japan.

Prison Tour

The highlight of the conference was touring El Buen Pastor Prison, the only women prison in Costa Rica. Pictured are prison officials giving an orientation to the tour.

El Buen Pastor Prison

Although it is a prison, there is a home-like atmosphere where the prisoners live.

Local Art

The painting on the left was also very impressive during the tour.

Prisoners with babys

Charles Thornton and Adrienne Shaw from the U.S. visit the mother and her baby. 67% of the 800 prisoners are mothers and they are able to keep their babies.

Prison Nursery

One of the mothers and her room where she lives with her baby.

Talk with Prisoner

On the right is Heidi Cerneka who is visiting with a prisoner. Heidi spent years in Brazil as a Maryknoll volunteer working with women prisoners.

Laundry Day

Just like home, laundry is hung out to dry.

Prison Visit

Conference participants Alan Vicens and Lymarie Nieves who are from Puerto Rico visit in Spanish with the prisoners and their babies.

CURE International Conference Costa Rica 2017

Over 40 prison reform advocates representing a dozen countries participated in CURE's 7th International Conference on Human Rights and Prison Reform which was held in San Jose, Costa Rica, April 25-29, 2017.

The theme was the Mandela Rules, which were adopted unanimously in 2015 by the United Nations and named after former prisoner and South African President Nelson Mandela.

They provide treatment of prisoners in the 21st Century and seek to transform imprisonment from wasted time to an opportunity for personal development. This results in substantially less crime.

For more information on the Rules including a copy of these 122 Rules on 29 pages, CLICK HERE

Clicking on speaker's name will download their presentation in ZIP format. Depending on the speaker the file may be a PDF or a PowerPoint file.

If you do not have software to view powerpoint we suggest the free office suite LibreOffice which is compatible with Microsoft Office. It is free and versions are available for Windows, MAC and Linux. If you need just a PowerPoint viewer this is free from Microsoft. For PDF viewing we recomment Foxit's reader, also free and more secure than the Adobe version.